What Are You Doing, Arkansas?

I have a personal interest in Exxon's recent oil spill. I learned to fish in Lake Conway as a child, and later I lived in Mayflower. My fond memories have been overshadowed by the depressing news. Things aren't going to be the same for the affected Arkansans for a long time.

What's more depressing is the surrender of Arkansan leadership to Exxon. I'm talking about the media restrictions on the cleanup site.

Now I know that on a project like this, the performing company needs to have at least some access control in order to do their job effectively. You see a simple example of this in road construction sites where a flagman is directing traffic. I go along with the flagman in such cases.

And if I drove up to a disaster cleanup site and was told I couldn't drive through the neighborhood, I'd probably comply too, at least if it wasn't my neighborhood. Even though I'd be mightily interested in how a multinational corporation is handling operations on American soil, I'd probably cooperate because I don't need to see everything myself.

We have the press for that.

Global Warming for Conservatives

Despite all the talk about rebranding the Republican Party, there hasn't been much talk about improving the actual product. There hasn't been much talk, for instance, about abandoning bad ideas.

One of the bad ideas the GOP needs to drop is science denialism, especially if it wants to represent itself as the organized political expression of American conservatism. We're going to talk about the GOP's denial of anthropogenic climate change.

The Denier Model

Whether they're denying AGW or evolution, science deniers rely on a distorted model about how science and scientists work. In this model, scientists are at best incompetent and at worst corrupt. In this model, someone who knows nothing about science is magically qualified to judge scientific work. In this model, science has never done anything for anybody.

Reality Drop: Crowdsourced Spam

Just to be clear, I want to see a more scientifically literate America. I want the conservative movement in general and the Republican party in particular to drop science denial as official policy. And I definitely want to see America lead the world in dealing with the threat of anthropogenic global warming. Because of those feelings, I have to applaud Reality Drop's goal of combating science denialism through better communication, but I can't commend their method.
Reality Drop

Reality Drop is a tool for commenting on news websites. It links stories about AGW in card-like units. Each story is marked as "Reality" or "Myth", and each one gives you a choice to "Destroy Denial" or "Spread Truth". In other words, for a "Reality" story, you can follow the link and post supporting information. For a "Myth" story, you can post corrective information.

So far, so good.

Proposed Resolution for the Texas Legislature

A Response to H.C.R. No. 58 by Phil Stephenson

According to the Internet, Texas state representative Phil Stephenson filed a resolution calling on the Texas legislature to mention the Judeo-Christian-Islamic god more and to post more copies of the Ten Commandments. This annoys me on a number of levels.
http://www.capitol.state.tx.us/tlodocs/83R/billtext/pdf/HC00058I.pdf#navpanes=0

First, resolutions like this are essentially meaningless, and engaging in meaningless activities when the nation has Things To Do is a waste of time and money.

Second, I'm tired of people telling me, as this resolution does, what the Founding Fathers thought about something in an attempt to do an end run around the clear language of the Constitution. Understanding what the Founders thought about things certainly helps illuminate the Constitution, but it's only the words that made it into that document that bind us. And those words established a secular government, not a church.

GOP Still Doesn't Get It

According to the Internet, the Republican Party still thinks it can "message" it's way back to relevance.

We care: Cantor wants to give GOP a 'makeover', change the message

Eric Cantor apparently wants everybody to forget the Republican message of the last few years. Part of that message was portraying Obama as a socialist/communist/marxist foreigner who wants to destroy America. Part of that message was that America is divided into makers and takers. Part of that message was that multinational corporations are not only American citizens, but they're special citizens who are exempt from responsibility and exempt from the morals that bind individuals. Part of that message is that it's okay to attack labor unions, even though they're an integral part of the free market.

Part of that message was the psychotic pseudo-principle that tax rates can only ever decrease. Part of that message was the insane notion that unemployment is caused by the unemployed. Part of that message was that it's okay to be anti-freedom as long as you yell real loudly that you're pro-freedom. Part of that message was that scientists are frauds and liars who are  incompetent even in their own specializations, but conservative entertainers and politicians are ultimately reliable authorities about everything. Part of that message was that the GOP wants to theocratize America, partly by preaching fundamentalist Christian doctrine in public schools, even if they have to ignore and violate the Constitution to do it. Part of that message was that we can ignore the unintended consequences of our actions, even though that is a complete rejection of conservative principles.

Arizona's Great Loyalty Oath Crusade

In the novel "Catch-22", set in an American bomber base during World War II, Joseph Heller tells in one chapter the tale of the Great Loyalty Oath Crusade. If I remember correctly, it was started by one officer who wanted to punish another officer by making everyone take a loyalty oath and then not letting the target officer take the oath so it could be proved that he was disloyal.

It quickly spun out of control. The nitwit who started the whole movement kept introducing new loyalty oaths to prove how much loyaler he was than everyone else, which meant that everyone else had to take even more oaths. Soon, the pilots and aircrews couldn't get anything done without taking loyalty oaths, signing loyalty pledges, and even singing loyalty songs. The crusade finally collapsed when one officer refused to participate, stopping with the nonsense with the classic pro-freedom declaration, "Gimme eat."

Some people don't know that "Catch-22" is a novel. They think it's an instruction manual. And now we know where some of them live. Arizona.

I Said I Would Hurl. I Hurled.

According to the Internet, Governor Bobby Jindal said: ""We had a number of Republicans damage the brand this year..."
Jindal takes on Obama, challenges Republicans to redefine party

I said I would hurl if I heard another Republican talk about the party as a "brand". I hurled.

Here's what I think happened. Back in 2007, the GOP coalesced around its corporate worship meme. It became almost indistinguishable from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. This meant corporate cash buying political support that helped increase corporate cash in a weird cycle of profit distillation that only a fool would say was the desired outcome of a capitalist economic engine.

That wasn't the problem.

Saving the GOP

Summary: Charles Krauthammer doesn't get it.
How to Save the Republican Party, Charles Krauthammer, FoxNews.com

Krauthammer says that the Republican Party is divided by tactics, not philosophy. In other words, there's nothing wrong with the party platform, they just need a better delivery. This is close to all that nauseating talk about rebranding the GOP, and it misses the point.

Tactics aren't the problem, because the GOP doesn't have a record to support any tactics. The last time Republicans ran America, we got tax cuts, but we also got increased spending, bigger government, and less freedom. The GOP broke its promise. It was anger over this betrayal that drove the early Tea Party movement.

That's why the current GOP fanaticism about fiscal responsibility is a lie. The party wants credit for dedication to ideals that, based on their real-world performance, they neither believe nor follow.